


deep in my bones (i can feel you)

by Makd



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Post-breakup
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-05
Updated: 2016-03-05
Packaged: 2018-05-24 20:19:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,994
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6165511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Makd/pseuds/Makd
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If Clarke was being honest, the fifth glass of wine was probably a mistake. As were the next two glasses of champagne, and the brightly coloured drink with a candied orange slice sitting primly on the side of the glass. Booze and a broken heart- what a great combination. </p><p>Written for the 2016 Bellarke Valentines</p>
            </blockquote>





	deep in my bones (i can feel you)

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for [Sydney](http://rebelknightbellamy.tumblr.com/) for the annual Bellarke Valentines Event. This was my first time writing angst, but I hope you enjoy it! 
> 
> Huuuuuuge thanks to [Liv](ohana-of-mashed-potatoes.tumblr.com) for the beta'ing, this was a mess before you worked your magic!

If Clarke was being honest, the fifth glass of wine was probably a mistake. As were the next two glasses of champagne, and the brightly coloured drink with a candied orange slice sitting primly on the side of the glass.

Coming to this wedding at all was probably a mistake in itself, because Clarke’s suffered through almost a full day of watching Wells and his fiancé (whose name Clarke can’t remember for the life of her in her drunken haze) positively glow with happiness, gentle hands always reaching for each other, private smiles of joy and whispered promises of commitment. Meanwhile, Clarke is desperately trying not to self destruct in the middle of the lavish reception because here she is, alone, sad and drunk at her best friend’s wedding, feeling like a big fat joke.

She’s watching Wells and….his fiance (Angie? Anne? Andrew?) sway slowly together on the dance floor, small smiles on their faces and eyes locked together in a gaze so intimate Clarke has to quickly avert her gaze. She’s struck with such a sudden pang of longing that it steals the air from her lungs for a second. She wants this. She wants a big, beautiful wedding and a gorgeous white dress and an extravagant cake and intricately handcrafted decorations- she feels the want of it like a gaping wound in her chest. Most of all she wants someone. Needs someone with her whole being that she can’t help but drown herself in alcohol to forget the feeling, though she can’t hide this overwhelming clutch on her heart forever.

She wants someone to laugh with, and to hold her hand, someone to remind her to throw out empty milk cartons, and to hold her at night. Clarke wants so many things, and this stupid wedding is only reminding her of how she almost got everything she wanted, only to bail at the last minute. Making it the biggest mistake she’s ever made, to date, even with the countless amount of alcohol she has consumed tonight.

The alcohol makes Clarke’s head fuzzy and she pushes through the crowd, away from the edges of the dance floor, suddenly desperate for air. She walks straight out the doors of the reception, the hard floorboards turning to plush carpet that sinks under her feet as she reaches the hotel lobby, and the harsh jolt of solid concrete as she strides down the pavement. The bright sounds of celebration fade and she keeps walking, the glow of the streetlamps low enough for Clarke to walk quickly, but strong enough that she feels no fear.

She takes her heels off after the fifth block.

The glitzy office buildings and skyscrapers turn into grey apartment buildings, and Clarke’s climbing up the stairs before she realises where she is.

The peeling paint on the walls, the white lights spaced unevenly in the corridors, the low buzz of the radiators. The dull thud as she raps her knuckles softly against the door, the drop of her stomach as she realises what she’s just done. There’s a soft creak as the door swings open, a figure surrounded by the light of a lamp inside the apartment. Apartment 203.

“Bellamy.” The name escapes her lips with a rush of air, blood pounding in her ears as she drinks in the sight of the man standing in front of her.

Bellamy Blake, sleepy and dishevelled, standing in front of her in his pyjamas. Black wisps of hair curl on his forehead, and the array of freckles that adorn Bellamy’s face are exactly the same as Clarke remembers. She doesn’t know why she expected them to have changed.

He’s wearing my bath robe, is the first thought that enters Clarke’s head. Oh shit is the second.

“Clarke?” Bellamy’s voice is rough with sleep, and his sleepy surprise is quickly turning into something cold and closed off, apprehension clouding his usually warm eyes. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“I don’t know.” the words tumble out, slurred and slightly desperate. Clarke wishes Bellamy could understand what they mean. I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know why I miss you so much. I don’t know why I can’t forgive myself. I don’t know why I pushed you away. I don’t know why I couldn’t love you when I do, I do, god I do.

Bellamy’s face softens for a second before hardening almost instantly. “Are you drunk, is that why you’re here?” Clarke shakes her head, the tight feeling in her chest expanding as she tries to sort out the mess in her head. But it’s so hard, there’s too much she wants to say and she’s too scared to say any of it. The man in front of her, god, she loves him but she doesn’t know how. Fuck it.

“Okay.” Clarke breathes out slowly, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet. “Okay.” She drops her heels on the floor beside her and shakes her arms out, almost as if she were getting ready to run a race. Her heart’s pounding so violently she might as well be.

“What are you-”

“Shut up.” Clarke cuts Bellamy off before he can continue. She needs to do this now and if he starts talking she’ll lose the momentary courage she’s found, and then Bellamy will go back inside with a quiet, “Go home, Clarke,” and Clarke will leave with shameful tears staining her cheeks and a burning heart in her chest. “Don’t say anything, just let me speak-fuck, okay,” Clarke’s breathing heavily now and she’s scrambling to form coherent ideas in her tipsy state, but she can’t back out of this one. Not with Bellamy.

The dark man in front of her eyes her warily, face clouded with caution but also soft concern and it makes Clarke ache for what she had with him two months ago, when they were tumbling headlong into something they didn’t understand but fuck- they were so happy. Fuck it.

“I’m pathetic,” is what comes out of her mouth when she finally opens it to deliver Bellamy her glorious, noble speech about why she’s back at his door at 3am. Bellamy seems taken aback, his cool facade cracked momentarily. This wasn’t exactly what she had planned, but fuck it, right?

“I, Clarke Griffin,” she stumbles over her name a little, the ‘r’ sounds making it hard for her to pronounce the ‘f’ just after, “am pathetic. This is because of two reasons.” Clarke holds up two of her almost frozen fingers just in front of Bellamy’s eyes. His only response is to raise his eyebrows, the tips of his dark curls meeting them in the middle of his forehead.

Clarke puts one finger down. “Reason number one: I broke up with you because I fell in love and got scared.” A sharp intake of breath from Bellamy, and a cracked voice on the words 'love’ and 'scared’ from Clarke. A deep breath, and she continues.

“We were in the car one day, to be honest I don’t even remember where we were going,” a small smile flickers across Clarke’s features, and she shakes her head, “but you were singing along to that awfulsong about selfies and I…” Clarke falters, her gaze fixed firmly on a spot on the ground, right next to Bellamy’s left foot. An ant scuttles inside the apartment.

“It just hit me,” her voice is thick with tears by now and they’re leaving hot trails on her cheeks, but she forces herself to keep talking, to just explain, “I looked at you and I felt so happy. God, I just felt something squeeze in my chest and I was just like- fuck, this is what it’s like to love someone.”

Clarke chances a look up at Bellamy’s face, and her tears fall faster when she sees his face remain absolutely blank, a muscle jumping in his jaw. This was a mistake. Bellamy must notice her distress, and his face softens and his hands reach out as if to comfort her, but she takes two stumbling steps back and his hands freeze. Clarke wants to scream at him to hold her, to touch her and to wrap his arms around her until he’s all she knows. But she knows she doesn’t deserve that.

“So we’re sitting in the car,” Clarke continues, her voice shaking with her tears, “and I’ve just realised I love you. And instead of telling you like a sane person, I freak out.” A gasp of a laugh escapes her lips. She remembers this exact day, burned into her mind like some cruel reminder of what a disaster she is. She remembers how tears burned in her eyes as she laughed at Bellamy’s performance of that stupid selfie song, she remembers how quickly her laughter turned to silence when those three words fell onto her tongue and almost slipped out of her mouth. She remembers how sour they tasted as she forced them back down her throat.

“Clarke-” Bellamy speaks for the first time since Clarke started talking, and his voice is small and raw. A pained expression paints his face into a grotesque image of the smiling, happy man she loved. Clarke shakes her head, and Bellamy falls silent again. 

“Next thing I know, I’m avoiding you because I’m scared. I’m picking fights because I’m so fucking terrified. I’m making excuses to not come home at night, and then I’m screaming horrible, horrible things at you and then I’m just gone. I was so scared. I didn’t know how to-“ how to love someone. Shame settles deep in Clarke’s stomach, the full weight of the crushing wretchedness she’s felt since shoving all her clothes into a dusty old bag and slamming the door behind her shatters around her. The shards cut deep into her skin, and she feels each and every one.

Bellamy’s frozen in the doorway, eyes wide and chest heaving. He looks raw, like he’s been ripped open and hastily sewn shut. This is unfair, Clarke thinks, it’s not right to just dump all this on him. I can’t come back and just pull shit like this. This was a mistake. A mistake. She turns to leave, her shoulders slumped in defeat and choked sobs bubbling in her throat, when careful fingers wrap around her wrist, warm and solid. She shivers at the contact.

"You didn’t give me the second reason.” Bellamy’s voice is soft, and if Clarke trusted herself in this drunk and desperate state she’d say there was something akin to hope in his voice.

“The second reason?”

“Yeah.”

Clarke pauses, the silence of the hallway suddenly deafening. Does she risk it all and possibly end up more heartbroken that before? Or does she play it safe and live in uncertainty and regret? Her mouth decides before her head has caught up.

“I’m pathetic because I still love you.” It’s stated simply and without grandeur, as if Clarke had just said 'I don’t like celery’. But celery didn’t lead her here at 2am, and celery didn’t let her break her own heart and celery sure as shit doesn’t leave you feeling like you’re being torn up from the inside out. No one told me it would hurt this much.

Something flashes in Bellamy’s eyes, dark and intense and Clarke feels her heart speed up. The fingers that loosely clasp her wrist move up her arm, and then to her neck with a featherlight pressure, ghosting over her skin and leaving goosebumps in their wake.

A heavy palm comes to rest on her pulse, and Clarke leans into the touch, eyes closed as the warmth spreads through her body.

When she opens her eyes, Bellamy meets her gaze, dark eyes shining with tears.

“I guess that makes me a little pathetic too.”

Clarke scoops her shoes off the floor, the pressure in her chest dissipating, as Bellamy pulls her inside. She’s never felt so warm in her life.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed! Kudos and comments are greatly appreciated, let me know what you thought!


End file.
